Syntronik [update March 2018: New T-03 Bonus Content & 4-for-1 bass synth promo] available

[ghettosynth]

What would be just as nice would be if folks would finally get that. No, this isn't for everybody.

Do you think people are stupid, of course they (we) get it? Some of us were hoping for something more modelled than sampled and now that it's clear what this is are just saying why this isn't something we are interested in any more (obviously recognising that this isn't for everybody).

Absolutely. This is a rompler that has almost the simplest possible feature set exposed for sample based instruments. The features that I mentioned earlier are basic and suitable for romplers. I'm not buying for a second that people don't want bipolar envelopes or oscillator mixing.

I'm also not buying that taking care of oscillator mixing "behind the scenes" means anything other than, that's how it's sampled. Even it if is, we have no way of evaluating either the veracity of the value of such a claim other than reading in between the lines and listening. So, with oscillator mixing, that's meaningless. For things like sync, there are technical reasons why that it's almost certainly sampled and that there are no real "parameters" behind the scene. I think that it's fair game to criticize anything that hides important parameters. This goes for actual synths that do this, one knob products, auto mastering tools, etc. If one doesn't like the criticism, then talk about the technology in ways that will convince the technologically savvy that your ideas are important. If you can't or won't do that, then you're just going to have to accept that some people are not going to take claims at face value. Giving every "synth" the same architectural interface is not particularly inspiring IMO, bordering on lazy even. You can do better even not going beyond sample based instruments.

If you want a collection of samples of analog instruments with basic tweaking then this may be for you, but, that's what it is and many of us have those kinds of samples in spades and never use them.

Again, I remind those of you who have to turn everything into a false dichotomy that this isn't "IKM hate", it's fair discussion and criticism of a new product. If you want to announce your new product in the instrument section on KVR, then sorry, it's going to be evaluated for what it is and that evaluation may not all be roses and caviar. This is where we talk about instruments and that's exactly what we're doing.

[Peter - IK Multimedia]

If you want a collection of samples of analog instruments with basic tweaking then this may be for you, but, that's what it is and many of us have those kinds of samples in spades and never use them.

Again, I remind those of you who have to turn everything into a false dichotomy that this isn't "IKM hate", it's fair discussion and criticism of a new product. If you want to announce your new product in the instrument section on KVR, then sorry, it's going to be evaluated for what it is and that evaluation may not all be roses and caviar. This is where we talk about instruments and that's exactly what we're doing.

This is a collection of classic and iconic synthesizer sounds with a carefully-crafted easy-to-use interface. It is not intended for someone who wants to create infinite synthesizer sounds from scratch. We have all the parameters in the world that we could expose if we wanted to, but it would make the interface a lot more difficult to use and generally undesirable for most people. We have chosen the provide the most popular controls so users can edit our sounds quickly and easily. But (again) this is not the product for someone that wants a total control synthesizer with a mod matrix, etc.

[wagtunes]

What would be just as nice would be if folks would finally get that. No, this isn't for everybody.

Do you think people are stupid, of course they (we) get it? Some of us were hoping for something more modelled than sampled and now that it's clear what this is are just saying why this isn't something we are interested in any more (obviously recognising that this isn't for everybody).

Absolutely. This is a rompler that has almost the simplest possible feature set exposed for sample based instruments. The features that I mentioned earlier are basic and suitable for romplers. I'm not buying for a second that people don't want bipolar envelopes or oscillator mixing.

I'm also not buying that taking care of oscillator mixing "behind the scenes" means anything other than, that's how it's sampled. Even it if is, we have no way of evaluating either the veracity of the value of such a claim other than reading in between the lines and listening. So, with oscillator mixing, that's meaningless. For things like sync, there are technical reasons why that it's almost certainly sampled and that there are no real "parameters" behind the scene. I think that it's fair game to criticize anything that hides important parameters. This goes for actual synths that do this, one knob products, auto mastering tools, etc. If one doesn't like the criticism, then talk about the technology in ways that will convince the technologically savvy that your ideas are important. If you can't or won't do that, then you're just going to have to accept that some people are not going to take claims at face value. Giving every "synth" the same architectural interface is not particularly inspiring IMO, bordering on lazy even. You can do better even not going beyond sample based instruments.

If you want a collection of samples of analog instruments with basic tweaking then this may be for you, but, that's what it is and many of us have those kinds of samples in spades and never use them.

Again, I remind those of you who have to turn everything into a false dichotomy that this isn't "IKM hate", it's fair discussion and criticism of a new product. If you want to announce your new product in the instrument section on KVR, then sorry, it's going to be evaluated for what it is and that evaluation may not all be roses and caviar. This is where we talk about instruments and that's exactly what we're doing.

I get what you're saying and you're right, but Peter has already come out and said that this product isn't for somebody who is looking for in depth synth programming.

So why are we beating the dead horse?

We know what it is, let's move on.

[Peter - IK Multimedia]

...and of course nobody commented on the fact that Syntronik absolutely CAN do what that one posted video as a challenge was showing on an Andromeda A6 and that the Product Manager and one of the main designers of said classic synthesizer verified that (and is the main person behind Syntronik). Pretty flexible, and with some seriously talented and knowledgeable brainpower behind the product. I'd say there's an audience (posted specifically and I thought clearly in my previous response) for Syntronik who know exactly what they want and what they're getting.

[edit to remove an extraneous character. ok now back to the holiday here in the U.S. as I think people do understand the whos and whats of Syntronik]

[ghettosynth]

I get what you're saying and you're right, but Peter has already come out and said that this product isn't for somebody who is looking for in depth synth programming.

So why are we beating the dead horse?

We know what it is, let's move on.

Nobody's beating a dead horse, I responded to three specific discussion points. This is a discussion. So, to the extent that people continue talking about specific aspects, that discussion will continue.

Saying something isn't for everybody doesn't give you a pass on discussing a product's strengths and weaknesses. It's clear from this thread that our discussion has proved valuable to some shedding light on things that they hadn't realized.

Moreover, if I wasn't clear above as Peter quoted me without the surrounding context, I think that IK could have done a better job with the quasi-modeled "hybrid" approach. In other words, we weren't really saying the same thing.

[wagtunes]

I get what you're saying and you're right, but Peter has already come out and said that this product isn't for somebody who is looking for in depth synth programming.

So why are we beating the dead horse?

We know what it is, let's move on.

Nobody's beating a dead horse, I responded to three specific discussion points. This is a discussion. So, to the extent that people continue talking about specific aspects, that discussion will continue.

Saying something isn't for everybody doesn't give you a pass on discussing a product's strengths and weaknesses. It's clear from this thread that our discussion has proved valuable to some shedding light on things that they hadn't realized.

Moreover, if I wasn't clear above as Peter quoted me without the surrounding context, I think that IK could have done a better job with the quasi-modeled "hybrid" approach. In other words, we weren't really saying the same thing.

For that matter, every synth developer of every synth ever developed could have done better somewhere. As much as you love Reaktor, you have to admit that the preset management system isn't the greatest in the world. That's one thing that certainly could have been done better. And the suggestions in every thread for every synth posted here on what to add, change, or whatever, go on forever. Maybe I'm more easygoing than most but as long as I can see the GUI and the synth doesn't crash my system, I'm pretty much content with whatever they come out with. Yeah, I'm livid about Softube's non browser system because it's caused massive support issues for me, but other than that, you won't fine me complaining about a synth unless it crashes or has a GUI that I can't read.

What I find is that a lot of people here are picky beyond belief. And while they certainly have that right to ask for more features, after a while, it gets tiresome. It's gotta be more than 50% of the conversations around here and I think that's being kind. One member here flat out admitted that there isn't one synth made that he truly loves. To me, that's kind of sad for somebody who hangs out as much as he does at a synth forum.

Oh well, whatever. I guess that's what KVR is.

I think we should have a sub forum simply called "Feature Requests" so that here we can just talk about what we like about the software we use.

Not that that's ever going to happen.

[noiseboyuk]

One thing I'd like cleared up is if users have access to the raw samples - the oscillators (either single or multiple) directly, rather than just as part of a patch (without using Sample Tank). Makes a big difference, and I haven't seen anything about this yet. If you can't start with them then it's a preset machine and - to be fair - a pretty basic ROMpler with hopefully some nice filters, if you can then it might put people down some more creative paths, albeit with big limitations.

[ontol]

What I find is that a lot of people here are picky beyond belief. And while they certainly have that right to ask for more features, after a while, it gets tiresome. It's gotta be more than 50% of the conversations around here and I think that's being kind. One member here flat out admitted that there isn't one synth made that he truly loves. To me, that's kind of sad for somebody who hangs out as much as he does at a synth forum.

Oh well, whatever. I guess that's what KVR is.

[wagtunes]

What I find is that a lot of people here are picky beyond belief. And while they certainly have that right to ask for more features, after a while, it gets tiresome. It's gotta be more than 50% of the conversations around here and I think that's being kind. One member here flat out admitted that there isn't one synth made that he truly loves. To me, that's kind of sad for somebody who hangs out as much as he does at a synth forum.

Oh well, whatever. I guess that's what KVR is.

Here is the list of things I've complained about in regard to synths.

1) Bad GUIs. (biggest offender for me)
2) No demo version (because of possibility of crashing)
3) Overpriced in relation to synths with similar features

That's it. That's all I care about. If I demo a synth and it has 2 MSEGs instead of 3, I don't come back here and say "Can you please add another MSEG" or "Can you please add a bandpass and bandreject filter" or whatever.

If a synth doesn't have the features I want, I simply don't buy it and move on.

Nothing hypocritical about my remarks.

And the worst part is, when I do test a synth and come back and say the GUI is too small, I get everybody telling me "Get a bigger monitor" or do this or do that. You guys can't even accept my simple "The GUI is too small" and have to give me a hard time about it.

I have over 100 synths that certainly don't have every filter or LFO of MSEG or whatever in existence. I don't come here and list my "want list" to add to the misery that these developers have to go through. Have you seen the Avenger thread? There has to be at least 100 feature requests in it. Why? Because nobody is ever satisfied with what they're given.

My thinking is this. If you're not happy with the synth, why the f**k did you buy it?

There is only ONE synth that I've bought that I'm not happy with and that's just because it's stopped functioning. It crashes constantly and I can't even render a track with it. I can't even freeze it to render a track with it. Other than that, I'm content with every synth I've bought even if they're not perfect.

How many people here can say the same thing?

[iPlogger]

I am finding the questions and observations actually quite useful. For me, I get it's fairly basic editing, but now the question is to what level? There is a big difference to me if I can tweak pulse width, sync and OSC mix manually or if the samples themselves have fixed amounts baked in. It will help make a more informed decision. I know what I'm really getting for the price.

[wagtunes]

I am finding the questions and observations actually quite useful. For me, I get it's fairly basic editing, but now the question is to what level? There is a big difference to me if I can tweak pulse width, sync and OSC mix manually or if the samples themselves have fixed amounts baked in. It will help make a more informed decision. I know what I'm really getting for the price.

Think about it logically. If there are no controls on the UI for osc sync, how are you going to control osc sync through the samples?

Let's assume for argument sake that there are actually samples included with this and there is a series of samples that simulate an osc sync that are put together internally. Even if you had access to the samples, how are you going to manipulate them with no controls to do so and, more importantly, since each sample has a certain amount of osc sync built in, how are you going to make them sound any different?

What you would need built into this is something similar to Serum, where you could make your own wave table. I'm not seeing any way of doing that given what's on the front panel.

[ghettosynth]

Moreover, if I wasn't clear above as Peter quoted me without the surrounding context, I think that IK could have done a better job with the quasi-modeled "hybrid" approach. In other words, we weren't really saying the same thing.

For that matter, every synth developer of every synth ever developed could have done better somewhere. As much as you love Reaktor, you have to admit that the preset management system isn't the greatest in the world.

Again, I was being very specific. If IK had said "we're releasing a rompler with some basic editing controls." Well, then ok, that's pretty accurate. When you say that you're releasing a synthesizer with a hybrid approach, well, then that's another thing altogether.

Preset management isn't even the first thing that I'd cite among Reaktor's weaknesses, which you can read all about in other threads where they are on topic, not so much here.

[ontol]

addressed

[JonSolo]

I have purposely made myself scarce here (at KVR) because of these types of "discussions". But in looking through this, I have no idea what the issue is here. This looks to be a great product for anyone who does not have these bases covered elsewhere, such as UVI's or Arturia's stuff, and maybe even beneficial then.

As to rompler or synth... years ago I had a Korg X3. On the face it said SYNTH. In the booklets it said SYNTH. Everywhere you go it is listed as a synth. Website, ads, even at vintagesynth.com. One thing I can assure you- the new product by IK will be FAR MORE FLEXIBLE than the Korg X3 (which only had a digital lowpass filter, period).

The number of knobs or the depth of program-ability has nothing to do with the definition of synth. Neither does the sound source...look at the number of "synths" with PCM listed as their base (and not one filter on board). Syntronik IS a synth, of sorts, even if it is limited (but honestly looks fantastic and IS at a no-brainer price).

Geez I just added to this madness.

[wagtunes]

I have purposely made myself scarce here (at KVR) because of these types of "discussions". But in looking through this, I have no idea what the issue is here. This looks to be a great product for anyone who does not have these bases covered elsewhere, such as UVI's or Arturia's stuff, and maybe even beneficial then.

As to rompler or synth... years ago I had a Korg X3. On the face it said SYNTH. In the booklets it said SYNTH. Everywhere you go it is listed as a synth. Website, ads, even at vintagesynth.com. One thing I can assure you- the new product by IK will be FAR MORE FLEXIBLE than the Korg X3 (which only had a digital lowpass filter, period).

The number of knobs or the depth of program-ability has nothing to do with the definition of synth. Neither does the sound source...look at the number of "synths" with PCM listed as their base (and not one filter on board). Syntronik IS a synth, of sorts, even if it is limited (but honestly looks fantastic and IS at a no-brainer price).

Geez I just added to this madness.

It's like a disease from which there is no escape.